Experiment with FEEC BUT participation to fly to ISS with Aleš Svoboda

The Czech mission to the International Space Station (ISS) is drawing closer. According to the government, Air Force pilot Aleš Svoboda should launch in the second half of 2027, becoming the first purely Czech astronaut in history – provided all preparatory and approval processes are successfully completed. Svoboda finished his basic training this May. Flying with him will be the ICARUS ARMOR Next Gen experiment, coordinated by Brno University of Technology with the participation of the Department of Biomedical Engineering and the Department of Microelectronics at Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Communication BUT.

Major Aleš Svoboda, Czech military pilot, ESA Reserve Astronaut. | Author: Česká cesta do vesmíru

Svoboda will travel to space aboard a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft launched on a Falcon 9 rocket. During the mission, he will work on thirteen Czech scientific and technological experiments – six of which involve universities, research institutions, and companies based in Brno. Alongside BUT, projects are also being prepared by Masaryk University, Mendel University in Brno, and the Masaryk Memorial Cancer Institute. Czech Television introduced the upcoming mission and Aleš Svoboda in a report on its main news programme Události.

The ICARUS ARMOR Next Gen experiment is developing a digital twin of an astronaut – a model capable of predicting a person's cognitive performance under cumulative stress, such as high g-forces during launch or prolonged exposure to microgravity. "We want to significantly advance our understanding of how to manage the astronaut's adaptation period to microgravity conditions with the smallest possible decline in cognitive performance," says Vratislav Šálený from the Department of Biomedical Engineering, the experiment's scientific guarantor, summing up the project's goal. A short video explains how the project works. The Department of Microelectronics team led by Jaromír Hubálek is developing a watch for the mission featuring a globally unique sweat intensity sensor, which will continuously monitor the astronaut's physiological parameters. Negotiations are also underway for the watch to collect data already during the Falcon 9 launch itself.

The technology will also find applications beyond spaceflight – in the future, the digital twin could help predict driver fatigue or optimise the performance of people in demanding professions and elite sport.

Climate chamber at FME BUT – Jakub Arm (FEEC BUT) and Aleš Svoboda. | Author: Václav Koníček

For FEEC BUT researchers, the mission represents an extraordinary opportunity: technologies from Brno laboratories will be tested directly in orbit, under conditions that cannot be fully replicated on Earth. And in doing so, they will become part of the historic first mission of a purely Czech astronaut.

We reported on the experiment and its selection among the 13 projects for Svoboda's mission last autumn: Ceremonial presentation of experiments for Aleš Svoboda's mission

Source: FEEC BUT

Author Ing. Zdeňka Koubová
Published
Link https://www.vut.cz/en/but/f19528/d337739
Vesmírné a letecké technologie Space Applications Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Communication Biomedicínské inženýrství science and research Faculty of Mechanical Engineering